Talking Water

“One of the greatest learnings through the Walking Water pilgrimage was that we had in between time–between the three parts over three years to incorporate the dialogues, the learning circles, the new relationships, and to give time for those to grow between year one and two and between year two and three. That’s what I’m being moved with today, moved through the honoring of taking time to be with...

“I’m telling these stories, because change is within our power. It’s within our reach.” –Andy Lipkis Welcome to the year-long Water Learning Series: Los Angeles, where we will host 11 conversations with organizations, community projects, tribal organizations, activists, organizers, and leaders from L.A. and places impacted by L.A.’s water story.   We welcome Andy Lipkis to session two of the serie...

“More than what you call the capturing or retention of these waters, is speaking up to give the waters their rights. They need to flow freely. We need to stop taking the water from up north, which means we need to figure out how to stop damming up our waters. We had water sources. What happened to them? We need to bring that back. More than what we call things, we need to use our voice to do the r...

“Community power drives our work. It’s the base of our work. We definitely wouldn’t be at the solutions without that community power.” -Erica Diaz, Community Water Center We welcome Erica Diaz, Community Solutions Advocate for the Community Water Center . Erica shares inspiration from her work with rural Central Valley communities that are leveraging community-power to assure clean, safe, and reli...

“The power of the experiences I’ve shared…the wake up call opened my eyes, not to scarcity, to the abundance that we don’t see. We create scarcity by throwing away water.” -Andy Lipkis We’re joined by Andy Lipkis, a visionary and pioneer in urban and community forestry and watershed movement in Los Angeles and world-wide. Andy shares with the Walking Water community formative experiences of organi...

“What I’m trying to do is create projects that bring us together in awe, wonder, and empathy with water, connecting and reanimating the connection with water as a life force and inspiring support for its regeneration.” -Melissa McGill Artist, activist, and water storyteller Melissa McGill joins Talking Water for a conversation on the transformative power of the arts in connecting and inspiring peo...

“There are global water protectors all around the world committed to this work, and we need to do it together. We need to know there are others doing this work, so we don’t feel alone in the work, and know that we are connected energetically through the waterways, supporting one another…” -Elizabeth K Nguyen, MD Elizabeth K Nguyen, MD, water keeper, psychiatrist, and author, joins Talking Water th...

We welcome Dr. Crystal Cavalier-Keck Dr. Crystal Cavalier-Keck is the co-founder of Seven Directions of Service with her husband. She is a citizen of the Occaneechi Band of the Saponi Nation in Burlington, NC. She is a board member of the Haw River Assembly, the Women's Resource Center in Alamance County, and Benevolence Farm. Crystal was a Fall Cohort of the Sierra Club's Gender Equity...

Walking Water, Three Creeks and the Owens Valley Paiute-Shoshone Cultural Center invites you to listen to this conversation with local and global Water Protectors. Together we welcome Dr. Rajendra Singh, the "Waterman of India," along with Kathy Bancroft (Tribal Historic Preservation Officer of the Lone Pine Paiute Shoshone Tribe), Paul Huette (Acting Chairman of the Owens Valley Indian...

We welcome Tala Khanmalek to Talking Water.  Tala Khanmalek (she/they) is a writer, activist, educator, and sailor-in-training. She is the creator of Sailing for Social Justice, which was a sponsored project of the Detroit-based Allied Media Projects. Her water work links sailing with social, environmental, and healing justice in both theory and practice. Sailing for Social Justice began with a dr...

Join us for a conversation with Teri Red Owl, Kyndall Noah, Paul Huette, Rosanna Marrujo and Ian Bell of the Owens Valley Indian Water Commission, Gigi Coyle, Teena Pugliese, Jen Schlaich and Cassandra Ferrera as we discuss an exciting water & land back moment in Payahuunadü and a watering hole known as Three Creeks. Three Creeks is on the traditional homelands of the Nüümü (Paiute) and Newe (...

W e welcome Rabea Herzog and Benjamin von Mendelssohn from the Tamera peace research center in Portugal.  O ur focus is on the design of Water Retention Landscapes as developed and built by the Tamera community and its connection with the themes of love and sexuality. Hosted by: Kate Bunney Produced & Edited by: Teena Pugliese and Anne Carol Mitchell Intro music by: Mamuse 'River Run Free...

We welcome you to join the Walking Water team - Kate Bunney, Krystyna Jurzykowski, Justine Epstein, Rina Kedem and Guardians - Gigi Coyle and Orland Bishop - for our Renewal and Review.  Our intention is to offer an end of year review of the work and events of Walking Water and a shared renewal space together with you. We believe in being transparent with how we have moved through the year, the de...

W e welcome Brock Dolman Brock Dolman is a co-founder of the Sonoma County based Occidental Arts and Ecology Center , where he co-directs with Kate Lundquist the WATER Institute and the Bring Back the Beaver Campaign . He is a wildlife biologist who is nationally recognized as a restoration ecologist and renowned innovator in watershed management and Permaculture design. Brock integrates wildlife...

We welcome brontë velez and justine epstein on the theme of water and eros.  about Our friendship, scholarship and praxis has many and ever-evolving intersections as comrades and clowns hospicing dying systems and reckoning towards repair with ancestors and the earth in times of deep unrest. we enter these conversations and inquiries from different contexts, with different bodies and stories and f...

W e welcome Betsy Damon to join us in conversation.  Betsy Damon is an internationally acclaimed artist who has been called a practical visionary and a humanist. Her work has been widely reviewed, exhibited, and taught. She’s known for her performance works, like 7000 Year Old Woman (1976), and her large-scale ecological designs like The Living Water Garden (1998) in Chengdu, China. She has direct...

Join us in welcoming Emmett Brennan.  Emmett is an artist and story teller who uses film as a way to orient humanity towards care, curiosity, and repair. Both poetic and practical, his work gives momentum to the cautiously hopeful dreams in our hearts and offers deep insight into the interdependent relationship we share with the whole of life. He is most well known for producing ‘Inhabit: A Permac...

Join us in welcoming Rina Kedem (Israel) and Sami Awad (Palestine).  Our conversation focuses on the effects of the long running conflict in Israel/Palestine on water issues. Also Rina and Sami share about their work together based on Sacred Activism.  This episode was recorded on October 09th 2021 Hosted by: Kate Bunney Produced & Edited by: Teena Pugliese Intro music by: Mamuse 'River R...

Join us in welcoming Sofia Sadogurska and Mariia Diachuk of EcoAction, Ukraine.  Our conversation focuses on both the beauty of Ukraine and also the impact the Russia/Ukraine war is having on communities, the earth and the waters. The effects of war on the environment are devastating for generations to come.  This episode was recorded on June 22nd 2022 Hosted by: Kate Bunney Produced & Edited...

Join us in welcoming Barbara Vlamis of AquAlliance and MaMuse.  Our conversation focuses on the work of AquAlliance whose mission is to defend northern California waters and to challenge threats to the hydrologic health of the Northern Sacramento River watershed. We also receive some beautiful music from MaMuse including a song called 'River Under the River' written to support this impor...

Join us in welcoming Marcela Olivera Our conversation focuses on themes such as water privatization, the human rights of water and ways of community building around water. Also, Marcela shares about the water wars in Cochabamba, Bolivia, and how the peoples uprising reclaimed the water from the private water company, Bechtel.  Marcela Olivera is a water commons organizer based in Cochabamba, Boliv...

In this important episode, Marsela Pecanac and Lejla Kusturica of ACT talk about the water situation in the Balkans and the work of ACT.  ACT supports activists and artists in the Western Balkans by helping them rebuild their communities and by challenging systemic injustice through frontline partnerships and strategic campaigns. ACT’s nomination helped secure the 2021 Goldman Environmental Award...

In this deeply moving conversation, Orland Bishop and Gigi Coyle explore the essence of water and what it represents to us as human beings.  Gigi Coyle is the co-founder of Walking Water,  and founder of Beyond Boundaries, an inter-generational pilgrimage of service and a response team for our times. She continues today as a rite of passage guide for organizations and individuals as well as a coun...

In this episode we welcome Zachary Wise, Creator of Water Stories Zach is the protégé of revolutionary Austrian farmer Sepp Holzer. He is the first and only person to earn a Holzer Practitioner certification directly from Sepp - through a rigorous two-year apprenticeship. After learning from Sepp, he set out to create Elemental Ecosystems, a business that provides an action-oriented process to imp...

Kathy Bancroft is the Tribal Historic Preservation officer and Elder of the Lone Pine Paiute-Shoshone tribe and Alan Bacock is the former water coordinator with the Big Pine Paiute Tribe. Both have been instrumental on the path of Walking Water. We will hear some of the water history of Payahuunadü (Owens Valley, Eastern Sierras, CA), what is happening currently in the valley's relationship w...